14 COEVID^, 



March, and the young are fledged by the end o£ April, The nest 

 is like that of the European bird, and all the manners of tlie 

 Afghan Magj^ie are precisely the same. They may be seen at all 

 seasons." 



From Afghanistan, Lieut. H. E. Barnes writes : — 



" The Magpie is not uncommon in the hills wherever there are 

 trees, but it seldom descends to the plains. They commence 

 breeding in March, in M'hich month and April I have examined 

 scores of nests, which in every case were built in the ' Wun,' a 

 species of Pistacia — the only tree found hereabouts. A stout fork 

 near the top is usually selected. 



" The nest is shallov\' and cup-shaped, with a superstructure of 

 twigs, forming a canopy over the egg-ca^'ity. The eggs, generally 

 five in number, are of the usual corvine green, blotched, spotted, 

 and streaked, as a ride, most densely about the large end with 

 umber mingled with sepia-brown. The average of thirty eggs is 

 1-25 by -97." 



Colonel Biddulph writes in ' The Ibis ' that in Gilgit be took a 

 nest with five eggs, hard set, in a mulberry-tree at Nonval (5600 

 feet) on the 9th May. Also another nest with three fresh eggs at 

 Dayour (5200 feet) on the 25th May. 



The eggs are typically rather elongated ovals, rather pointed 

 towards the small end, but shorter and broader varieties, and occa- 

 sionally ones with a pyriform tendency, occur. The ground is 

 a greenish or brownish white. In some eggs it has none, in others 

 a slight gloss. Everywhere the eggs are finely and streakly 

 freckled with a brown that varies from olive almost to sepia ; about 

 the large end the markings are almost always most dense, forming 

 there a more or less noticeable, but quite irregular and undefined 

 cap or zone. In one or two eggs dull purplish-brown clouds or 

 blotches underlie and intermingle with this cap, and occasionally a 

 small spot of this same tint may be noticed elsevA'here when the 

 egg is closely examined. 



12. Urocissa occipitalis (Bl.). The Red-billed Blue Magpie. 



Urocissa sinensis (Linn.), Jenl. B. Ind. ii, p. 309. 



Urocissa occipitaUs {Bl.), Iltmie, Rough Draft N. 4'- E. no. 671. 



I have never myself found the nest of the Eed-billed Blue Mag- 

 pie ; although it does breed sparingly as far east as Simla and Kote- 

 gurh, it is not till you cross the Jumna that it is abundant. East 

 of the Jumna, about Mussoorie, Teeree, Gurhwal, Kumaon, and in 

 Nepal, it is common. 



Erom Mussoorie Captain Huttou tells us that " this species 

 occurs at Mussoorie throughout the year. It breeds at an elevation 

 of 5000 feet in May and June, making a loose nest of twigs exter- 

 nally and lined with roots. The nest is built on trees, sometimes 

 high up, at others about 8 or 10 feet from the ground. The eggs 

 are from three to five, of a dull greenish ash-grey, blotched and 



